It’s Nigh Time to Grandfather Hemp

Humans and the animals humans eat have been ingesting phytocannabinoids such as THC and CBD for many thousands of years, in many different cultures, without any social, mental, or physical problems arising from consumption.

The sticky resin on the flowers of the female Cannabis or Hemp plant (same genus, different end-uses) contains cannabinoids, including THC and CBD. Physically near that resin are the seeds. Lower THC hemp thrived in the temperate latitudes and contained CBD, and Cannabis at the sub-tropical/tropical latitudes had higher THC, higher total cannabinoids, and more resin.

Therefore regulations should not be as though CBD and the other cannabinoids were a new substance for humans and animals to consume, or that there’s some question as to toxicity, or that they should be Scheduled, Novel, or Controlled.

Rather, we should recognize that Hempseed and therefore consumption of cannabinoids, trace and not, is ancient and worthy of Grandfathering into food and drug regulations as a food pre-existing regulation for millennia. After more than 12.000 years with no regulation, it is the world’s longest, broadest, and largest toxicology study, with not one death.

There are at least 144 cannabinoids found in Cannabis. The best known is THC, but also CBD, THCa, CBDa, CBGa, CBG, CBLa, CBCa, CBC, CBEa, CBNa, CBN, CBL, CBT, CBE, CBND, THCVa, CBDVa, CBGVa, CBLVa, CBCVa, THCV, CBDV, CBGV, CBLV, CBCV, and more. As recently as 2015 another 7 were discovered.

Some cannabinoids interact with the body’s own Endocannabinoid System (ECS), which evolved over millions of years concurrently with Cannabis. The ECS is found in any animal with a nervous system, controlling many functions, and is estimated to be over 600 million years old. The two most important Endocannabinoids are anandamide and 2-arachidonoyl glycerol.

Mankind’s long coevolution with Cannabis might be due to the cannabinoid receptors found in the body, which compose the ECS. Endocannabinoids and phytocannabinoids act upon these receptors. Cannabinoid receptor 1 is most plentiful in the brain, spinal cord, some peripheral organs and tissues such as the spleen, white blood cells, endocrine gland and parts of the reproductive, gastrointestinal and urinary tracts. Cannabinoid receptor 2 is most plentiful in the white blood cells, the tonsils, and the spleen. Cannabis is one of mankind’s most-studied plants.

My work starting in 1994 included making sure hempseed used for commercial food products in the US had no cannabinoids transferred to the food, for legal and quality assurance reasons. Difficult to remove from the outside shell, that’s how I came to realize we have been eating minute amounts of cannabinoids for thousands of years. Removing the shell reduces cannabinoid content, but shelling of hempseed is a relatively new invention, only

22 years old. And Oil pressing is still performed on whole, not shelled, Hempseed. I believe that many of the healthful and healing qualities attributed to Hempseed oil may actually be from the cannabinoids in the oil.

Here, I conflate “Hemp,” “Cannabis,” and “Marijuana”: it’s all the same genus, only end-use dictates whether it is drug Cannabis (Marijuana) or fibre Cannabis (Hemp). Today’s legal definition (0.2% to 1% max THC depending on nation; a standard only 60 years old) is too rigid to confine what our ancestors also called “Hemp” for thousands of years.

The genus “Cannabis,” also known as Hemp, Hamp, Chanvre, Canapa, Cañamo, Hanf, Hennep, Ma, Asa, Kanab, Dagga, Ganja, Maconha, and Konopi, is indigenous to the Russian plains, the Caucasus, Transcaucasia, the Crimea and the Urals, from China to the Balkan Peninsula. Cannabis pollen millions of years old has been identified in Eurasia.

Humans and animals have consumed Hemp flower products (and thus cannabinoids) for many millennia around the world, including the USA where Hemp has been grown continuously since at least 1606, in Jamestown. The most-predominant cannabinoid in Hemp is Cannabidiol (CBD).

The resin adhering to the female flowers as well as fine particles of resin-containing flower are inevitably consumed when the seed is eaten or pressed for its edible oil. This sticky adherent on the outside of the shell of the hempseed is difficult to remove. Even with modern cleaning methods removing that resin from Hempseed is difficult, one study shows as high as 117.5 parts-per-million THC remaining in common health food store Hempseed oil. So difficult in fact, that the Hempseed oil industry won a suit against DEA in 2004 to be allowed to leave any amount of undisclosed THC in Hempseed oil, due to this sticky resin. The THC limit on all hemp products in the U.S. is now 3.000 ppm.

Hemp has been used in human cultures since prehistoric times, at least since the end of the Pleistocene era. From Africa to Japan to Scandinavia to Eastern and Southern Europe to the Americas, Hempseed has been an essential commodity to eat, grow, and trade. The use of Hempseed for food is many millennia older than even the use of Soybean for food.

Hempseed is high in essential amino (23% protein, edestin and albumin types) and fatty (25%, including omega-3 and GLA) acids, vitamins and minerals, and fibre (35%). It contains more protein than beef and more omega-3 than fish. It can be eaten raw or cooked. Even the protein type is called

“edestin,” from the Greek edestos meaning “to eat.” Highly versatile, hempseed could be eaten years later, fed to animals, converted to oil for eating or lamps, or planted as a seed or fibre crop.

In the U.S., Hemp enjoys a legal exemption from the Controlled Substances Act (stalk and nonviable seed), protections for viable seed, flower and cultivation in Section 7606 of the 2014 Farm Bill, and protections afforded by the Ninth Circuit Court in 2004 as to incidental THC or other cannabinoids remaining in products. Natural cannabinoids were never Scheduled by Congress, only parts of the plant.

Discovering Hemp’s fibrous properties was most likely a byproduct of seed collection for food. The use of Hemp predates the dawn of agriculture. Ancient Chinese texts and archeological evidence suggest that Hempseed use for food in China reaches back into the early Neolithic period and perhaps to the late Paleolithic.

Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture noted “There are… at least three chronological horizons to which the spread of hemp might be ascribed: the early distribution of hemp across Europe; during the Neolithic c5000 B.C. or earlier; a later spread of hemp for presumably narcotic purposes around 3000 B.C.; a still later spread, or, at least, re-emergence of hemp in the context of textiles during the first millennium B.C.”. Indeed, the use of Cannabis in Europe goes much further back than recorded history and it was an integral part of pre-historic and pre-Christian European culture.

Examples of early dates for Hempseed recovered in East Asia are quite old (4800, 3500, and 2500 B.P.) yet with one exception from Japan (10000 B.P.) not as old as some from northern Europe (7000 and 5000 B.P.). Moldova (6000 B.P.), Hungary (5000 B.P.), Sweden (2000 B.P.), Italy (1900 B.P.), Switzerland (1800 B.P.), the Netherlands (1900 to 1750 B.P.), the British Isles (1600 B.P.), Norway and Denmark (1150 to 1100 B.P.) all have sites where ancient Hempseed has been found.

Hemp may have been one of the first cultivated foods in China. By comparison, soybean has been used as food for only about 3.000 years, also in China. In regions where Hempseed was common it was often considered an animal fodder and famine food, eaten only during times of shortage of more-desirable foods. However, in ancient northern China, Hempseed was one of the most important “royal” grains. Hempseed is still enjoyed as a snack food throughout China.

In the 6th century B.C., the Ch’i Min Yao Shu advises: “Some of China’s most important crops, like rice, millet, and hemp, have been cultivated since Neolithic times.” Hempseed was the sole source of edible vegetable oil in areas of Asia where imported vegetable oils were unavailable or prohibitively expensive.

Definitive records of the medicinal and physiological effects of Cannabis are found in the earliest pharmacopeia in existence. Pn-ts’ao Ching, attributed to the legendary Emperor Shen-nung of about 2000 B.C., was compiled in the first or second centuries A.D., but was based on traditions passed down from earlier, even prehistoric, times. In Cannabis recovered from a 2.700-year old grave in northern China were found the cannabinoids CBN, THC, CBO, CBD, CBC, CBE, CBL, CBNV, and THCV.

Hempseed was recognized in the Chinese book Pen Ts’ao Kang Mu (1596 A.D.). It refers to works from previous authors dating back centuries in a discussion of Hempseed use as a food. According to the book, the Chinese had developed Hemp cultivars to such an extent that seeds grew as large as garden peas and were reputed to have been of the highest quality. Today it’s a widely-accepted food for the elderly in China, supplying easily-digestible protein and dietary roughage.

Also in China the oldest agricultural treatise is the Xia Xiao Zheng (1600 B.P.) which names Hempseed as one of the main food crops that were grown then, along with millet, wheat, beans, and rice. Records from a Chou Dynasty state banquet show that boiled Hempseed was served in cereal dishes in 1000 B.P.

Just as they have for millennia, farmers living in remote mountainous regions of southwestern China still make porridge with Hempseed, and the seeds are also commonly parched, milled, and mixed into buttered tea by Tibetan peoples such as those living in northwestern Yunnan province. The Hmong have long made a bean curd similar to tofu, from the milk of the Hempseed.

Hempseed was found in an excavated latrine in Japan, indicating that it was eaten by people at that time (710 A.D.). Hempseed was also a part of the traditional Japanese diet, eaten as porridge. When armies of the feudal age went to war in Japan, they often subsisted on balls of ground Hempseed and brown rice gluten to keep them strong. In contemporary Japan, Hempseed is found in the diet as part of the traditional shichimi (seven spices) seasoning powder used to flavor udon noodles, and also a dish called Asanomi (“asa” means “Hemp”).

Hemp farming is older than rice farming in Japan. From The Japan Times (2014): “’Most Japanese people see cannabis as a subculture of Japan but they’re wrong,’ Takayasu says. “Cannabis has been at the very heart of Japanese culture for thousands of years.” According to Takayasu, the earliest evidence of cannabis in Japan dates back to the Jomon Period (10000-200 B.C.), with pottery relics recovered in Fukui Prefecture containing seeds and scraps of woven cannabis fibres. These are the oldest known Hempseeds in the world and belong to the early Holocene period. “Cannabis was the most important substance for prehistoric people in Japan,” he says. “They wore clothes made from its fibres and they used it for bow strings and fishing lines.’”

For many centuries people living in the northwestern Himalayan foothills of India and Nepal have grown Hemp for fibre and also roasted and ate the seeds. In modern India, Hempseed is still eaten by many poor people. An Indian food called bosa consists of the seeds of goose grass and Hemp, and another, referred to as mura, is made with parched wheat, amaranth or rice, and Hempseed. Badil, a chutney mix featuring Hempseed, is one of the traditional dishes of a tribal people located in India. A smooth paste condiment consisting of ground Hempseed with chopped onions, chili peppers, and turmeric is commonly served throughout the Nepali Himalayas as a savory and nutritional supplement in the ubiquitous staple dish of beans and rice.

Perhaps the most popular Cannabis drink in the world is India’s Bhang, a milk and Hemp concoction used as early as 1000 B.C. by millions of Hindus annually.

Cannabis was available in Mesopotamia during the 6th century B.C. at the time when the Hebrew Bible was compiled in Babylon, thus even the Bible mentions Hemp. In Genesis 1:29: “And God said, ‘Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed [such as Cannabis], which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit [hempseed is actually a fruit] of a tree [hemp can grow like a tree] yielding seed [hempseed]; to you it shall be for meat [hempseed protein is a high-quality protein].’” Cannabis is mentioned 5 more times in the Bible as the healing oil Kaneh Bosm. Some scholars consider the “Tree of Life” in Genesis 3 to be a Cannabis plant.

Depictions of the Cannabis plant can be seen in sealings from as early as 4th century B.C. in present-day Iran. Also in Persia Hempseed was used as a source of food and oil since at least the 10th century A.D. A 6th century dish contained Hempseed and was called sahdanag, the “royal grain.” The Jewish people had a lengthy and valuable association with the Hemp plant, and learned to make sahdanag from the Persians, preserving their name for it long ago. This adopted meal of roasted Hempseed became well-liked during the medieval period in Europe, where immigrant Jewish merchants sold it in marketplaces.

In Pakistan, Iran, and Turkey, baked Hempseed is sold by street vendors and is popular among children as nuts for snacking. The drinks Soma and Haoma (3rd century B.C.) likely contained Cannabis. The Knights Templars are reputed to have made a drink called “Elixir of Jerusalem,” using Cannabis grown under contract by the Saracens in Spain.

Hempseed is also an ancient crop in Russia, with a range reaching far to the north. A collection of Russian manuscripts written during the 16th century A.D. provides details about how a proper Russian home should be managed. In the sections dealing with food products, it indicates that provisions of Hempseed and Hempseed oil should be stored in the home. It also includes three references to Hempseed used principally as an oil source but also how to make Hempseed cakes. Hemp was an important trade item in Russia for centuries.

The Altai nomads of northern Russia cultivated early Hemp crops and used it as a food source rather than a fibre crop (300 B.C.). They relied mainly on the oil but the high content of protein made it a valuable food that was easy to transport.

Russians and Poles roast Hempseed, mix with salt, and eat them on bread. There are many Baltic and Eastern European ethnographic references to people preparing and eating Hempseed. In Poland, Hempseed was stewed into a popular porridge eaten in monasteries, military barracks, and among the less-affluent.

Russians traditionally used few fats besides butter, Hempseed oil, and imported olive oil. Hempseed or its oil were used in a variety of dishes, either integrated into the meal directly or the oil was used as the medium in which the dishes were cooked, and Hempseed was a common part of food grants or donations to the needy in the 16thcentury.

The Svaneti of Georgia:

“…Yet as soon as I say the word “cannabis,” he grins. “People don’t know about this important part of our history,” he says, explaining that until Soviet inspectors arrivedin the ‘70s, every Svan

household grew cannabis plants, which were used in their entirety. People plied the stem fibres into cloth and rope, and pressed the seeds for oil. Buds, flowers, and leaves (plus ground-up seeds) found their way into gooey cheese breads (knash), vegetable-walnut spreads (pkhali), and juicy meat pies (kubdari).

Charqseliani misses the oil most. “It was a cure-all, for everything from upset stomach to insomnia to earache,” he muses, adding that Svan cannabis oil was pressed using five-ton machines and so prized along the Silk Road that the Greeks paid top dollar for it.

I asked if the cannabis-based dishes were psychoactive. “Absolutely not,” he says, though his wife, Iza, remarks that she always slept like a baby after eating knash for dinner. (That’s probably the CBD talking.)

Non-psychoactive cannabis seeds, which contain trace amounts of THC, were once a common ingredient in dishes across Europe and Asia, prized for their piquancy and nutrient-packed oil. Russians added them to peas, Poles boiled them in a Christmas soup called siemieniatka, and, in some parts of China, people still eat them by the handful like popcorn.”

The ancient nomadic Scythians have an even older history with Hemp, trading along the Silk Road and using Hemp ropes to domesticate horses. These ancient nomadic horse riders spread the name and use of Cannabis to many cultures, leaving traces in some of the world’s oldest cultures.

Hempseed use was widespread across temperate Eurasia early on, and after about 2000 B.P. in other major regions such as Africa. For example, Suto tribal women “grind up [hemp] seeds with bread or mealie pap [porridge] and give it to children when they are being weaned.”

In the Czech Republic has been found hemp rope dated to 26900 B.C., and Hempseed in a well dated to the Middle Ages. These seeds indicate cultivation and use of Hempseed for food. In the Medieval period in Prague Hempseed was added to gruel. Hempseed was found in a tomb dated to the 5th century B.C. in Brandenburg, northern Germany.

In the Zemaitija region, boiled potatoes were served with Hempseed. In Estonia, Hempseed was traditionally used in preparations of butter, milk, and porridge and in Finland, Hempseed was consumed as a ground meal mixed with barley, buckwheat, and salt. This preparation served as a “dipping food for boiled turnip roots.” When cereal meal was in short supply, Finns sometimes added “hempen meal” with flour to produce bread. Oil derived from pressed Hempseed was an important part of traditional societies in Finland, Russia, Poland, and other Eastern European countries.

Hempseed is also revered in ritual settings. On March 25 Lithuanians traditionally celebrated Stork Day with a feast dedicated to remembrance of Angel Gabriel’s announcement that heaven chose Mary to be the Mother of Jesus. In the 19th century, Samogitians (a Lithuanian ethnic group) prepared special foods for this feast day, including pastries made of Hempseed and krupninkas (spiced honey liquor made with sweet vodka seasoned by herbal mixtures). Throughout Lithuania eating these ritual pastries and special breads baked from a mixture of many grains, and including Hempseed, assured an abundant harvest.

Peasants planted Hempseed on saint’s days. Eating Hempseed porridge, they were more resistant to disease than the nobility, who considered Hempseed a food of the lower classes. Monks were sustained by three meals a day of Hempseed in the form of porridge, gruel, or soup.

Hempseed was an abundant food of the rural poor in 15th century Europe because of increased hemp cultivation for fibre to supply colonial ships with sails and rope. The seed by-product came from the traditional hemp cultivation zones in northeastern Europe, where it was made into vegetable oil, hempseed meal, and a smooth paste similar to peanut butter.

In the Baltic nation of Latvia, hempseed is traditionally included in festival foods on St. John’s Day. A soup made from Hempseed, called semientiatka, is eaten ritually on Christmas Eve in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Ukraine. Southern Slavs offered Cannabis seed at weddings to ensure happiness and wealth. In both Latvia and Ukraine, a dish made of Hempseed was prepared for Three Kings Day on January 6.

A Lithuanian tale about the beginning of Lent concerns the epic battle of Gavenas and Mesinas in the threshing barn at midnight between Shrove Tuesday and Ash Wednesday, 40 days before Easter. The protagonist Gavenas symbolized Hemp, while Mesinas represented bacon or ham. During the Lenten fast, foods were prepared with Hempseed oil since animal fat and meat were forbidden. Thus the beginning of Lent represented the victory of Gavenas and the defeat of Mesinas. In another Lithuanian tradition, before Candlemas on February 2, the maidens pooled their money and bought liquor, which they boiled together with poppies, Hempseed, and honey; roughly symbolizing happiness, well-being, and love.

Hempseed butter is typically spread on toast or rye bread, or may be used as an ingredient in various recipes. Chefs use Hempseed butter as an ingredient in many local dishes, as it is said to impart a pleasant accent to the overall flavor.

The first literary evidence that ancient Greeks consumed Hempseed appeared around the middle of the 4th century B.C. During this time at special gatherings were eaten kannabides, which translates as “a confection of Cannabis seeds and honey.” Several centuries later, the famous Greek physician Claudius Galen tells us that cakes containing Hempseed were still being eaten. A dish was served after the main meal in the form of “small cakes” at banquets and was popular among the Romans of his time. The Greek physician Dioscorides (40-90 A.D.) describes and extols the benefits of Hempseed, including the use for food.

Hempseed dated to the Gallo-Roman period in northern France found the seeds among stored food plants in the burnt attic of a granary building dated to the end of the 2ndcentury A.D. Rabelais praises Hempseed in his book The Histories of Gargantua and Pantagruel (1534) saying that Hemp is the king of the vegetable world and that Hempseed is part of any great meal.

Many Hempseeds from Roman times up through the Middle Ages have been recovered from sites in the British Isles, suggesting Hemp began to be cultivated in this region in Anglo-Saxon times.

Hemp has been discovered in iron age contexts in western Europe, such as a Celtic burial site in Germany. Other Celtic evidence of Cannabis is evidenced by reports of hemp fibres from objects recovered at St. Andrews in Scotland from 800 B.C.

Cannabis may also have been a sacred plant of the Druids. According to ancient literature the most-prized plant of the Gallic Druids was known under the name verbena, and this has generally been interpreted as the plant, vervain. But due to the fact vervain fills little of the ancient attributes of the magical verbena, its identity has been called into question. “An Old High German Gloss” stated that “vervain, which is called hanf” [Hanf is German for Hemp]. Thus the Gauls used the Germanic word for Hemp to refer to the magical “vervain” of the Druids. There is also evidence for a Gallic-Celtic use of Hemp as a fumigant.

The presence of Hemp in Italy during Roman times is supported by the discovery of nine Hempseeds found along with many seeds of other useful plants at the bottom of a storage vat near Pompeii. Ancient Hempseed has also been recovered from sites in Italy that date to the sixth to seventh centuries A.D. In addition, ancient Cannabis seeds were discovered in northern Italy and dated to the 10th to 12th centuries A.D. Fibre as old as 11.500 years has been found next to Lake Albano, near Rome, Italy. Chisled over a building entrance in Milan is a saying translated as “Hemp for strength.”

It was so popular in Italy that the oldest cookbook ever written (known as “De Honesta Voluptate Et Valetudine” or Of Honest Voluptuousness and Health, 1465), contains a recipe calling for Cannabis/Hemp flower products. It is even decarbed, in nard oil (spikenard or muskroot, aromatic amber-colored essential oil derived from Nardostachys jatamansi, a flowering plant of the valerian family). Written in Latin by Bartolomeo Platina, it was largely a translation of recipes by da Como from his Libro de Arte Coquinaria (1465). The book was frequently reprinted over the next century, and translated in French, German and Italian.

The English Translation of the recipe is:

“To make cannabis yourself known as flax for thread [the fibre hemp variety]

Use a mallet to crush clods [flowers or buds] collect after good harvest

Taken as food in wine or cake

Add cannabis to nard oil in an iron pot

Crush together over some heat [thus decarboxylated to convert any nonpsychoactive THCa to psychoactive THC, and CBDa to CBD] until juice

A health drink of cannabis nectar

Carefully treat food and divide for the stomach and the head

finally remember everything in excess may be harmful or criminal.”

Cultivation of Hemp was widespread by the 19th century in Canada, and prospective migrants were offered free plots of land and Hemp seed to cultivate as an incentive. The Doukhobors, a sect of spiritual Christians which arose in 18th century Russia, migrated to Canada in the late-19th century to escape persecution. They brought their traditional uses to the newly-established territories along with the seeds themselves, and even after Cannabis was outlawed in 1923 it was widely used in soups, cereals and other foods. In the New World, they resumed growing and using hemp for food and fibre before and after prohibition.

Hemp was a major economic crop in the American colonies because of the demand for rope. Growing it was mandatory and taxes could be paid in hemp. In “Hemp: American History Revisited – The Plant with a Divided History” is the mention that colonial Americans brewed Hemp flowers as a tea.

But eating or drinking various forms of Cannabis products was not the sole method of consumption. “I believe that the acceptance of tobacco in Europe was undoubtedly enhanced by European familiarity with smoking hemp. Tobacco was, in many ways a counterpart to hemp, all the familiar features were there. Brought to Spain from the New World as a medicinal plant, it came to be regarded as a cure-all; the Amerindian ritual use of tobacco may also have been known, and eventually also its psychoactive qualities. Even the use of pipes for smoking tobacco in the Near East was adopted from the water-pipes used for smoking hemp. Like hemp, tobacco is chewed, sniffed and smoked. Perhaps the spread of tobacco was so rapid and overwhelming in the Old World, because a receptive ground had been laid by the traditional folk uses of hemp.” S. Benet, 1975.

Pre-dating the U.S. Food and Drug Administration by almost 100 years is the “safe, efficacious cannabinoid product grown from Hemp and made in the U.S. in a consumer package recommended and dispensed by licensed pharmacists” model, so-called patent medicines. Maltos, a Scandinavian drink formulated with Hemp, was sold in the US in 1895.

In 1937 the general counsel of the National Institute of Oilseed Products testified before the Ways and Means committee of the U.S. House of Representatives studying Marijuana prohibition. Hempseed was known as a primary survival food during times of famine in China, Europe, and Australia. Near the end of World War II, hempseed saved multitudes of starving people in northern China. He referred to its significance: “Hempseed… is used in all the Oriental nations and also in a part of Russia as food. It is grown in their fields and used as oatmeal. Millions of people every day are using hempseed in the Orient as food. They have been doing this for many generations, especially in periods of famine.” He also claimed that Hempseed was the finest bird seed available.

The California company Sharon’s Finest introduced many commercial Hempseed foods into international distribution, including Hemp Hummus (containing Hemp flowers, Hemp stalk, and Hempseed), HempRella cheese alternative, Hempeh Burger and Hempseed oil. All are pre-DSHEA, being introduced before the October 1994 cut-off date.

Conclusion

Humans and the animals humans eat have been ingesting cannabinoids for many thousands of years, in cultures around the world, with no toxicity.

New regulations should not treat CBD and the other cannabinoids as though they were a new substance for humans and animals to consume, or that there’s some question as to safety or toxicity, or that they should be Scheduled, Novel, or Controlled.

Rather, we should recognize that consumption of Hempseed and thus cannabinoids, trace and not, is ancient and therefore worthy of Grandfathering into food and drug regulations as a food pre-existing regulation for millennia, same as rice or millet. After more than 12.000 years with no regulation, it constitutes the world’s longest, broadest, and largest toxicology study, with not one death.

Today in the U.S., we continue to see a denial of the potential and safety of cannabinoidsdespite Congressional intent, 90% public support, and 81 years of unconstitutionality. It is not actually prohibited as an illegal drug, rather it is permitted as a controlled substance. Thus the federal government retains a monopoly with thousands of patents issued to itself and its friends (DEA Licensees), even actually growing and selling Cannabis to researchers , a mockery of equal protection under the law, and social, academic, and medical justice.

Few factors have degraded respect for the government, police, and the rule of law as much as Cannabis prohibition. The harms of enforcement of Marijuana laws far exceed even the exaggerated potential harms of the plant, restricting patient and doctor access to the safe, efficacious medicine of their choice. Human rights and public health are diminished when research into an efficacious and ancient plant is reduced by unnecessary government interference.

“The prestige of government has undoubtedly been lowered considerably by the Prohibition law. For nothing is more destructive of respect for the government and the law of the land than passing laws which cannot be enforced.” ― Albert Einstein

###

Abel, E. 1980. Marijuana: The First Twelve Thousand Years.

Accorsi, C., et al. 1998. “Evidence of the cultivation of Cannabis in Roman Times in the Holocene Pollen Diagrams of Albano and Nemi Lakes (Central Italy).” Proceedings of the VII International Congress of Ecology—INTECOL, Florence, Italy, July.

Ahokas, H. 2003. “Major Discharge and Floods of the Kymi River (Kymijoki) over the Salpausselkä Iesker to Coastal South Finland Traced by 14C datings, Unequal Land Upheaval.” Oral Tradition and Onomastics.

Bandini Mazzanti, M., et al. 2005. “Plant Use in a City in Northern Italy during the Late Mediaeval and Renaissance Periods: Results of the Archaeobotanical Investigation of ‘The Mirror Pit’ (14th –15th century A.D.) in Ferrara.” Vegetation History and Archaeobotany 14 (4): 442–52.

Zajaczkowa, J. 2002. “Hemp and Nettle: Two Food/Fibre/Medical Plants in Use in Eastern Europe.” Slovo, the Newsletter of the Slavic Interest Group.

Its use as a fibre as well as a grain was mentioned in such classical literature as the Shi Ching (Book of Odes) in the 11th century B.C., and Chou Li and the Li Chi (Book of Rites) in the 2nd century B.C. or earlier.